Professional full-time conservative agitator and co-founder of CANACE, Gary McHale has a WordPress blog listing him as a one-time candidate for political office in Haldimand Council, Ward 3 – Caledonia in the Canadian province of Ontario. His brief bio states that he has been a successful small business owner for over 30 years in the lucrative computer programming field, developing payroll and accounting software. He paints himself as the hard-working son of working class parents, as “one of six boys, three whom were born in Caledonia while his father worked in the town’s gypsum mines.” He also states that he worked hard all summer as a child, “haying and bringing in the grain from the fields.”

He furthered his education by attending a Baptist Seminary, the bastion of religiously inspired white male privilege and supremacy, and became a church deacon. He authored four right-wing Christian books and states that he “has a Christian duty to speak out against the injustices of race-based policy” that he claims is occurring whereby non-natives are the eternal victims of natives. Gary McHale is blind to his own unearned privileges (white male privilege) — he is convinced that he got everything all on his own merits. He ignores the fact that the escalator that carried him up to the comfortable echelons of upper-middle classdom is often broken for poor women, minorities, and First Nations people. In fact, for the latter group, the escalator runs in reverse — if it runs at all.

McHale says that it is his Christian moral compass, his admiration for Dr. Martin Luther King, and his belief in the “rule of law” that motivate him. He professes a support for Israel as he is quick to claim that his beef with Canada’s indigenous First Nations people has nothing to do with racism. Indeed. Josef Goebbels, Hitler’s chief minister of Reich Propaganda would find himself outdone.

It is no accident that McHale usurps the language and status of Jewish Holocaust victims and other minorities in an endeavor to launch his anti-native platform. This tactic has been used time and time again by far-right radicals in the US, which propelled America into the fascist, militaristic klepto-plutocratic cesspool that it is now where 60 million Americans live below poverty with no jobs, no access to education and healthcare, and no welfare safety net other than the now-reduced food stamp program. As of December 31st 2010, approximately 10 million poor US households are without life-sustaining utilities (gas, electric, or water). Close to 70 million Americans struggle to live on less than $7/day (with food prices comparable to Canada’s) according Brookings Institute reports and the most recent US Census.

All this in Christian “pro-life” America where 80% of all American women lack access to reliable contraception, 87% of all US counties lack abortion providers, 11 year-old rape victims are forced to give birth to their rapists’ progeny, OB/GYN’s are gunned down in church by radical Christian “pro-lifers”, feeding poor homeless people has been criminalized — while poor American women suffer maternal injury, death and disability rates rivaling those of four sub-Saharan Third World countries according to the most recent reports from the World Health Organization and Amnesty International.

Americans, especially poor women and children, are suffering horribly in this mess because of three decades of right-wing policies enacted in the wake of the same battle cries made by conservatives just like Gary McHale and white male supremacy groups like Northern Alliance.

In Canada, hate groups seek refuge by passing themselves off as legitimate political, religious, or academic movements — usually under the guise of free speech, taxpayer rights, and “getting tough on crime.” Many hate group members and their conservative fellow-travellers have joined mainstream political movements. The Canadian far-right ideology is gaining popularity among younger Canadians. The far-right is not a loose amalgamation of like-minded malevolents. It is a well-heeled vanguard movement of organized networks and individuals who are dedicated to promoting discrimination and hate to destroy the multicultural fabric of Canadian society. Gary McHale and company can spin it any way they want, but you can’t polish a turd.

At nearly all of Gary McHale’s rallies and protests, members of Canadian neo-Nazi and white supremacy groups show up to support McHale and his group, CANACE. On October 15th 2007, Dave Ruud and other members of the Northern Alliance came out to support McHale in Caledonia to protest against the Six Nations’ reclamation of contested lands in Caledonia that were never ceded by the Mohawk clan mothers as required under treaty per Haudenesaunee custom under the Great Law.

Ruud of Northern Alliance told Canadian news reporters, “The whole idea of land claims, reserves, is special treatment. The rest of us have to make a go of it on our own. This is special treatment. This is liberal policy, NDP, it’s a left-leaning policy. I don’t agree with any of it.”

Canadians, be afraid. Be very afraid. Not of “Mohawk warriors” or “natives taking over”, but of the putrid tide of fascism that has seeped across the threshold of your doorsteps. It has now flooded your living rooms, masquerading as “law and order”, “family values”, and “government accountability.”

Northern Alliance, based in London, Ontario was founded by a close associate of Holocaust-denier, Ernst Zündel. The group’s manifesto states it is opposed to abortion because “abortion stops a white heart.” Northern Alliance also argues that “only those with European ancestry should be permitted to become citizens of Canada.” This hate group also opposes interracial dating/marriage and same-sex marriage. Northern Alliance is affiliated with Aryan Guard, BC White Pride, the Imperial Klans of Canada, and the Brotherhood of Klans (BOK) — the largest Ku Klux Klan chapter in all of North America, which is headquartered not in rural Mississippi but in the outskirts of Regina, Saskatchewan. Northern Alliance is affiliated with other neo-Nazi organizations around the world and in the US.

CAFE was exposed by the Nizkor Project, an online database that tracks and exposes anti-Semitic organizations, white supremacists, and other racist and misogynistic hate groups like the Edmund Burke Society which promotes conservative ideologies of “family values” and denounces reproductive choice, women’s rights and worker protection laws as “communist.”

Paul Fromm and other members and founders of hate groups and their ultra-conservative fellow travelers are not merely operating on the periphery. They are politically active and provide financial succor to those who suborn fascism, oppression, and regimes of inverted totalitarianism. Political scientist Sheldon Wolin defined inverted totalitarianism as a form of fascist dictatorship that operates within the anonymity of the corporate state rather than through charismatic demagogues and “strong man” leaders of classical totalitarian regimes.

These self-described martyrs and patriots are not victims — they’re proponents of white male supremacy. They appropriate the language of their victims. They target Jews while legitimizing their agenda by professing support for Israel and hijacking the victims of the Holocaust. They target non-whites and the poor while having the moxy to twist the quotes of Dr. Martin Luther King. They target women by claiming to promote “family values” and “fathers’ rights.” And they target First Nations/Native American indigenous people under the pretext of “law and order.”

McHale’s prime benefactor and supporter Paul Fromm is also a prominent defender and ally of American neo-Nazi and former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard, David Duke of Louisiana.

Fromm’s career as a professional hater is long. In 1981, Fromm became treasurer of the Metro Progressive Conservative Party. He was fired after he said in a newspaper interview that the idea of a supreme race “is a good idea” and that Indochinese refugees should be sent elsewhere because “their influx into Canada will upset the racial balance.”

Fromm spoke at a Heritage Front rally on December 8th 1990 alongside members from some of the most extreme racist organizations in North America: the World Church of the Creator, Aryan Women’s Union, and Canadian Alliance. While speaking to the group of neo-Nazis, he said, “We’re all on the same side.” Fromm was greeted with the Nazi salute. Fromm denied being at the rally until a video later surfaced showing him speaking at the rally while surrounded by Nazi flags, swastikas, and White Power flags.

Fromm was also a keynote speaker at another Heritage Front meeting on September 5th, 1991. About 2 weeks later on September 24th, Fromm was ejected from the Toronto Mayor’s Committee on Race Relations for yelling “Scalp ’em!” in reference to aboriginal people while Rodney Bobiwash of the Native Canadian Friendship Center was speaking.

As director of CAFE, Fromm actively supports well-known racists and Holocaust-deniers like Ernst Zündel and David Irving. On November 7th 1992, Fromm traveled to Victoria, BC to speak on behalf of David Irving (who was deported a week later).

Fromm was also a speaker at a celebration of Hitler’s birthday in April 1992 at a meeting organized by the far-right Northern Foundation in Ottawa alongside the group’s leader, Ken Campbell. The Toronto Star reported on Fromm’s speech before the Heritage Front and his attendance at the Hitler birthday party. Fromm later claimed that he “didn’t know” about Heritage Front’s neo-Nazi views.

Fromm was surrounded by Nazi flags. He attends an Adolf Hitler birthday party. He tells Aryan supremacy groups that “we’re all on the same side” and screams that the Toronto mayor should scalp the natives. Yet he didn’t know he was cavorting with Nazi thugs and white supremacists. Uh-huh. Right.

A 2000 report reveals that wealthy land developer Martin Weiche, a German-born Nazi who immigrated to Canada on November 13th 1951, financially backed Paul Fromm and mentored him on the neo-Nazi path. Weiche is the former leader of the Canadian Nazi Party and in 1981 he was implicated as a major financial backer of Operation Red Dog — a failed criminal plot to overthrow the Dominican government.

In 2004, Paul Fromm and an entourage of fellow neo-Nazis and white supremacists were invited to Louisiana by David Duke, former Republican Louisiana state lawmaker and Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, for the purpose of forming a “unity pact” between all neo-Nazi and white supremacy groups. Duke describes himself as a “racial realist.” He uses benign euphemisms to promote his male chauvinist neo-Nazi agenda by claiming to champion “family values” and “the rule of law.”

Duke wrote a “self-help” book under the pseudonym Dorothy Vanderbilt titled Finders-Keepers aimed at poor white women, advising them to seek economic security by being dutiful bi-pedal house pets that obediently greet their white male masters of the universe at the front door after a day of domestic drudgery, ready to sexually service them like a porn star, and then trot off to nurse their litter. This out-of-print book gives extensive advice telling women how to do vaginal exercises, perform fellatio, and admonishes them to be more receptive to anal sex in order to get and keep their alpha “prince.” (alpha dipshit is more like it.)

David Duke organized his neo-Nazi gathering after his release from prison in 2004, He had been in prison for tax fraud. The purpose for this meeting was twofold: unifying the neo-Nazi white supremacy movement and collaborating to sanitize its image along with that of their ultra-conservative fellow travelers. Duke felt unification was necessary after the death of William Pierce, founder of the sexist and racist hate group National Alliance. Pierce is best known for his controversial novel The Turner Diaries, which he wrote under the pseudonym Andrew Macdonald. Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh was inspired by Pierce’s book.

At Duke’s gathering on May 29th 2004, Paul Fromm signed this neo-Nazi unity pact that later became known as the New Orleans Protocol. Under this pact, all neo-Nazis and white supremacists and their ultra-conservative fellow travelers are to support one another. Other signatories include (but are not limited to):

Don Black, former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan and founder of Stormfront. In December 2007, Black donated a sizable amount of money to Ron Paul’s (R-TX) 2008 presidential election campaign fund.

Willis Carto, a self-described “Jeffersonian and populist” who is famous for anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and Holocaust denial.

Kevin Alfred Strom, former managing director of Virginia-based neo-Nazi group known as National Vanguard. Strom plead guilty in 2008 to child pornography charges for which he was sentenced to 23 months in prison.

In 2007, Paul From was a keynote speaker at a White Christian Revival meeting. On March 21st 2009, Fromm actively participated in a White Pride march in Calgary, Alberta that was organized by Aryan Guard — a neo-Nazi group whose name is synonymous with domestic terrorism and violence, including random pipe bomb attacks.

Surprisingly, Fromm was allowed to run for federal political office despite his active support for, and association with, racist criminals and terrorists. He was a candidate running on an anti-immigration platform with the radical ultra-right wing Western Block Party.

Did you hear that, boys and girls? A racist supporter of domestic terrorism whose benefactor was a rich Nazi is allowed to run for public office while his patriotic conservative protégés, Gary McHale and Mark Vandermaas, play the martyrs as they sing the “lawless and lazy Indians” blues.

But McHale and company aren’t bigots, right? They just provoke confrontation while calling native rights activists “terrorists”, “lazy Indians”, and “thugs” while their buddy calls for city officials to “scalp them.” Gary McHale and Mark Vandermaas claim they’re not prejudiced against First Nations people —they just attract neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and anti-native bigots by accident.

Fromm was also an advocate for Glenn Bahr, who referred to First Nations people as “vermin” — which is the exact same terminology used by the Nazis in reference to Jews. On December 1st 2006, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal found Bahr guilty of violating the Canadian Human Rights Act.

Other associates of Fromm’s include former Internet service provider, Bernard Klatt of BC and far-right wing activist and Canadian lawyer Doug Christie, Jr. who specializes in representing neo-Nazis, Holocaust deniers and anti-native bigots. Doug Christie’s client list includes Ernst Zündel, Rudy Stanko (of the World Church of the Creator), and accused Nazi war criminal Imre Finta. Although Imre Finta was acquitted in 1990, he was reportedly a member of Hungary’s Nazified police force, the Arrow-Cross, and assisted in the liquidation of the Szeged ghetto (home of Eli Wiesal) and the forced deportation of the Jews of Szeged to Auschwitz.

Paul Fromm did not merely dabble in anti-Semitism and flirt with racism; he devoted his entire life to promoting neo-Nazi ideologies and supporting and mentoring upcoming fascist protégés. Just as he was backed by Martin Weiche, he now backs and supports Gary McHale and recruits other new would-be Nazis into the fold — targeting university students, patriots, and others with socially conservative views.

Gary "I'm Not a Racist" McHale's plea for help from his Aryan supremacy buddies at Stormfront

Is it reasonable to believe Gary McHale’s claims that he’s not a racist or a neo-Nazi as he points out that he and Mark Vandermaas are supporters of Israel by virtue of a link on their website?

Klaus Barbie —”the Butcher of Lyon” — one of many infamous top Nazi war criminals that escaped justice at the post-war tribunals courtesy of the Vatican rat-line, also supported Israel from his new life as a Latin American cocaine kingpin by shipping armaments to Israel despite an embargo at the time. That didn’t make him any less of a Nazi who had sent thousands of France’s Jews from Drancy to their deaths. Is it reasonable to believe that Klaus Barbie wasn’t a bigot because he supported Israel?

Every town that Gary McHale and his group descend upon, white supremacists and neo-Nazis show up to give their support. They’re drawn to him like maggots to bad meat.

McHale calls himself a civil rights activist. He claims he wants equal rights for all Canadians, and that he’s unfairly tarred with the racist brush when he’s just a social justice activist out for fairness and equity. If that were true, then why did he accept backing and support from a rabid neo-Nazi like Paul Fromm who called for the scalping of native people? Why did he accept support from white supremacist Dave Ruud of Northern Alliance at Caledonia in 2007?

If McHale is truly for equal rights and fairness, why did he not instead seek out support and help from Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center which is dedicated to promoting peace, tolerance, and social justice? Isn’t that something a legitimate and reasonable civil rights advocate would do?

Gary McHale points to the crisis at Caledonia and Oka, conjuring up fearsome images of violent Mohawk warriors to whip up public panic. He uses the picture of the native Unity flag (the “Mohawk Warrior flag”) and the photo of Sam Gualtieri, the badly beaten builder who got into an altercation with natives at Caledonia’s Douglas Creek Estates, to reinforce anti-native sentiments among the non-native population. He came to High Park in Toronto, telling anyone who would listen that they were in danger from Mohawk warriors and the presence of the “Mohawk warrior flag” proved it — referring to the Unity flag that was present during the encampment of native people who were there with the city’s permission to do restorative work in High Park.

But what Gary McHale can’t seem to explain is why the situations in Oka and Caledonia got volatile in the first place.

Not too far from the Canadian-US border in western upstate New York sits a large Iroquois reserve and in the middle of that reserve sits the town of Salamanca — right on native lands belonging to Haudenesaunee people. Salamanca has a lot of non-native residents. They’re surrounded by native people. Yet, the people coexist peaceably and seem to be able to get along. To the best of my knowledge, there has never been an “Oka” or “Caledonia” type of crisis there in my lifetime of 44 years.

So, the real question is not whether the Unity flag is a Mohawk warrior flag, or if “the natives get special treatment” from law enforcement. The real question is what are the people in Salamanca, New York doing right that they’re able to get along?

Jacqueline S. Homan holds a Bachelors degree in mathematics with a minor in physics. Coming from deep poverty in a Philadelphia ghetto, she is a social justice advocate for America’s poor and a freelance journalist and the author of four nonfiction books and several articles on medical ethics. She has been to several Cree reserves in the interior of BC in the Canadian Rockies , Alberta, and Saskatchewan. Her books, available through Amazon and Barnes & Noble, are: Classism For Dimwits, Eyes of a Monster, Nothing You Can Possess (in revision), and Divine Right: The Truth is a Lie.